Dreame X30 Ultra review: Tops in truly hands-free floor cleaning

At a glance

Expert's Rating

Pros

• Great vacuuming and mopping performance
• Self-cleaning
• Excellent navigation and obstacle avoidance

Cons

• Expensive
• Mop-raise system doesn’t always prevent carpets from getting wet

Our Verdict

The DreameBot X30 Ultra produces great vacuuming and mopping results with minimal input and intervention on your part. While it’s very expensive, it delivers a smart and automatic cleaning experience that justifies its price.

Dreame Technology’s luxe new X30 Ultra robot vacuum and mop combo is the latest appliance promising to relieve you of the burden of cleaning your home’s floors. It brings the latest technology to bear on the task, including a powerful 8,300Pa of suction, five customizable carpet-cleaning modes, rotating mop heads, and the ability to evaluate dirt levels and double back on areas that need extra attention.

When the job is done, the X30 Ultra’s auto-clean base station empties the vacuum’s dust bin, scrapes dirt off its mop pads while it’s being washed with hot water, and then dries the pads to prevent bacterial growth and odor. It can even refill the robot’s onboard tank with water and cleaning solution so it’s ready for the next job.

Design

The X30 robot, which measures 13.7 inches across and 3.8 inches tall, introduces a couple of innovations. The first is Dreame’s new Anti-Tangle TriCut Brush, which integrates cutting heads next to the roller brush to remove tangled hair so it can be deposited in the dust bag. The other is Dreame’s Flex Arm, which can extend the robot’s mop heads when it identifies corners and edges to ensure a complete cleaning. Additionally, the X30 Ultra can lift its mop more than 3/8 of an inch (up to 10.5mm) when it detects carpet to prevent dampening.

This review is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best robot vacuums.

The X30 Ultra’s behemoth base station measures 23 x 18 x 13.4 inches (HxWxD), housing a 3.5-liter dust bag, large enough to provide about 75 days worth of hands-free operation, according to Dreame. The bag sits in the belly of the beast, behind a removable front panel. A 4.5-liter clean-water tank and a 4-liter tank for dirty water collection are accessed beneath a lid on top of the station. Dreame’s designers were obviously at pains to minimize the impact of the station’s ample footprint. What they came up with—some beveling and gold trim—can’t camouflage the dock, but it should prevent it from completely disrupting the user’s home décor.

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Setup and performance

The base station comes fully assembled with its water tanks and dust bags in place, so you only need to plug it in and power it on. The robot’s mops and edge brush need to be attached, but they snap on easily. To connect the robot to your Wi-Fi, you download the DreameHome app and add the X30 Ultra by either scanning the QR code on the robot or selecting the appliance from a list of Dreame products that appear. A setup wizard prompts you through these connection steps and gets everything up and running in minutes.

Before you run the X30 Ultra, you must add water and some of the supplied cleaning fluid to the base station’s clean-water tank. The app offers two cleaning modes, “routine” and “deep;” you can select one or the other based on the relative cleanliness of your floors. In either mode, the robot vacuums and mops simultaneously, so you don’t need to run separate cleaning jobs.

When the vacuum encounters a rug or carpeting, it automatically boosts its suction and, as mentioned, raises its mop off the floor and stops dispensing water. This method isn’t foolproof, though, as I found out when it vacuumed the area rug in my living room and left it noticeably damp. Then one of its mops got caught on the edge of the rug and pulled off, dripping more water onto the rug.

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Fortunately, there is an alternative to the mop-raise function: mop-detach. Designed for high-pile carpets, it’s buried in the app settings; when it’s enabled, the robot will clean hard-surface floors, return to the charging dock to automatically remove the mop pads, and then go back to your carpets and rugs to complete the job. I set that as the default for all future cleanings and it worked flawlessly. A third option, Avoid, tells the robot to steer clear of carpets altogether.

That hiccup aside, the X30 Ultra cleans very well. I had no issues with hair tangles or the robot dropping debris on the floor en route back to its dock, and its mopping, which scrubs similar to a commercial floor cleaner, removed all but the most stubborn stains.

When the mop heads get too dirty–both during and after cleaning jobs–the robot returns to its dock, where they are automatically scrubbed and washed with 140-degree Fahrenheit (60 degrees C) water. The dock’s washboard is washed at the same time to reduce stain residue and eliminate bacterial odors. This is the only unpleasant element of the X30 Ultra experience, as it produces a lot of loud grinding, whirring, and gurgling sounds. It’s a small price to pay to keep your home odor free.

The Dreamebot X30 Ultra uses a combination of AI, an RGB camera, and 3D structured light scanning to navigate and avoid obstacles. It worked well enough that I never saw the robot bump into anything and, other than the incident with the mop pad getting stuck on the area rug, it never got into a jam from which I needed to free it.

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

Michael Ansaldo/Foundry

You can also view a live feed from the X30 Ultra’s camera using the Dreamehome app. This effectively turns the robot into a navigable home security camera. I’ll let you decide if that’s a pro or con, but it’s worth noting that there are privacy implications here, which Dreame outlines clearly in its real-time camera privacy policy the first time you access the feed.

The Dreamehome app’s user interface makes it easy to operate and manage the X30 Ultra. Key controls and vitals are displayed on the home screen along with a detailed map of your home’s floorplan. Its settings menu options offer deeper control over floor and carpet cleaning, scheduling, AI obstacle avoidance, and other functions. In addition to the app, Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant can be used to control the X30 Ultra with voice commands.

Should you buy the Dreame X30 Ultra?

The Dreame X30 Ultra is currently selling for $1,699.99, making it one of the most expensive robot vacuum/mop combos on the market. It’s also one of the best we’ve tested in terms of its cleaning and autonomy. Only you can decide if you can fit that expense into your budget; but if you can swing it, you’ll be amazed how luxurious cleaning floors can be.